Female sports talk host bites dust

San Antonio radio just lost its sole local female bonafide talk show co-host.

Sports aficionado Dawn Murphy, who added a refreshing woman’s point of view on KZDC-AM (ESPN 1250 “The Zone”) said she was fired Tuesday because of “budget cuts.” Though she wore many hats, Dawn was known best to listeners as the third host on the Chris Duel-Jason Minnix evening show.

It’s true there have been several cuts and consolidations recently at BMP radio — the company that owns KTSA, KZDC and others here — but as far as I know, Murphy was the only on-air voice to be cut.

Co-host Duel gave Murphy her start on local talk radio several years ago. She was initially hired at KTSA as a call screener for the old Duel show but moved up quickly to the job of producer.

Reached Wednesday, Duel said her ouster saddens him — particularly in these tough economic times — adding it certainly wasn’t performance-related. “Dawn was great,” he said, explaining she was hard-working and a respected participant on the evening sports show.

Murphy, who was an executive producer at KZDC and handled the afternoon sports updates as well as doing the 5-8 p.m. talk show, said she was surprised when she was called in Tuesday afternoon and given her walking papers.

“The ironic thing is that they were pushing me to be even more of a presence on the show,” Murphy, a mother of two, said. “They’ve even included me in the new billboards for ESPN.”

It’s true: From what I understand, the billboards which started going up in September, read: “Duel, Minnix and Murphy.”

Dawn, an auto racing junkie, also hosted a NASCAR show on the local ESPN station Saturday morning called “Track Smack.” I’m sure the racing enthusiasts will be steamed by the loss of that show as well. (Murphy had built up an impressive following in the relatively brief time the show was on the air.)

Looking at the bigger picture of local radio — the shocking dearth of a female perspective on opinion shows here — Murphy’s ax further points to the “boy’s club” nature of S.A. talk radio these days.

Yes, you’ll hear women occasionally share their opinions on air: Liz Ruiz on Trey Ware’s morning KTSA show and Charity McCurdy on San Antonio’s First News with Charlie Parker” are two. However, they’re really newswomen, not talk hosts.

Yet, I’m constantly hearing from listeners who say they’d love to see more women on local talk radio. So, bosses out there, when, for cripes’ sake, will this situation change?